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Part 1
Methodological and Conceptual Frameworks
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| 1 | Globalization, Labor Export and Resistance Rethinking Neo-Liberalism from Below |
The failure of neo-liberal globalization to deliver its promise â to bring progress to poor nations and the working class through global capital expansion and unregulated markets â and the global economic crisis that it has accelerated (Stiglitz 2000), and the challenges it has generated from social movement organizations makes it urgent that we re-think our conceptualizations about it. Such rethinking is extremely important since conceptualizations about globalization have implications for development policy, strategies for change, and the shaping of collective resistance toward the creation of a more just and equitable world. Important in this process of rethinking is to learn from the experience and collective resistance of those who are exploited and oppressed, especially of women on the periphery of the global political economy, since their experience embodies the intersectionalities of class, gender, race/ethnicity and nationality. This approach is congruent with what Arjun Appadurai (2001:5) in âGrassroots Globalization and the Research Imaginationâ in his edited volume, Globalization, advocates for the study of globalization: an epistemology that does not turn the âmore marginal regions of the worldâ merely into âproducers of data for the theory mills of the North.â This then requires a commitment to study the dynamics of âglobalization from belowâ â its institutions, horizons, and vocabularies â as it confronts globalization from above. In a similar standpoint, Norman Denzin (2009), in his Qualitative Inquiry Under Fire: Toward a New Paradigm Dialogue, argues that âimposingâ a theoretical framework following the positivist and postpositivist traditions is now being challenged in studies of global social justice. âThe insistence that writing and fieldwork are different cannot be allowedâ (Denzin 2009: 87). A text that is critical and emancipatory is one that reflexively reveals âstructures of oppression as they operate in the worlds of lived experienceâ and âcreates a space for multiple voices,â enabling those âwho are oppressedâ âto articulate their definitions of their situationsâ (ibid.: 105). In this multi-voiced space the researcher can also integrate her own reflexive statements as she analyzes or interprets the lived experience of the oppressed, articulating and making explicit her own standpoint and her own experience of their lived experience. Feminist research finds a home in this space, since it also includes reflexivity in its main task of unearthing and ârevealing the structures of oppression in womenâs worldsâ (ibid.: 106, citing Dorothy Smith 1992).
The experience of migrant domestic workers comprising mostly of women from the Global South â whose migration is linked to labor export due to globalization and who occupy the bottom ranks of the stratified global labor market, and are collectively resisting exploitation â offers a conceptual site for this kind of rethinking neo-liberal globalization. This is exemplified by the experience of Filipino migrant domestic workers whose massive migration to the core and semi-periphery of the global political economy has been largely influenced or shaped by the Philippine labor export development policy. Their experience opens a conceptual avenue to gendering analysis of neo-liberalism as it gives insight into the power dynamics in the globalization of reproductive labor. The inductive approach I utilize in my study of their experience â wherein I did not go into the field to test a single predefined theory or set of theories, or to test a set of hypotheses but instead draw out theoretical issues from their experience â is in line with the methodological issues earlier mentioned. The inductive approach I also use in presenting and analyzing accounts of the domestic workersâ experience and their politics of resistance is also in line with what Norman Denzin said, as I mentioned earlier, that fieldwork and writing are not different.
Methodology: Studying Domestic Workers on the Move
Insider/Outsider
As a Filipina sociologist, now living in the United States, while continuing links to my country of birth, I am both an insider and outsider to the migrant experience of the Filipino domestic workers in this study. I am an insider in the sense that I have also experienced how it feels to enter a foreign culture and be separated from oneâs family, sometimes experiencing alienation while at the same time finding a place where I can feel a sense of belonging, recognition, and support for what I can and want to do. Like the Filipino domestic workers who struggle to have their voices heard in policy, I, too, at times have to struggle to have a voice in the discursive academic circles whose mainstream paradigm of theorizing marginalizes the experience of Third World women. Obviously, I am also an insider because I share common ethnicity with the domestic workers who facilitated my entry into the field and mutual interaction with them. I am an outsider in the sense that I do not conduct my work in the foreign-home sites where the Filipino domestic workers in this study conduct their work and live as migrants. Although I do domestic chores it is not my paid work unlike the domestic workers for whom, in most cases, the foreign household is both their work site and their place of rest (if they have a place of rest at all). But by conducting fieldwork in which I could come face to face with Filipino domestic workers, I was given a precious opportunity to know some aspects of these workersâ lives. In going to these sites, I also experienced initial adjustments, such as knowing where to go and learning how to get around, sometimes by myself. There were many times I was stereotyped as a domestic worker, which I did not mind because it gave me an insight into the identity construction of the migrant women. But while I was an insider sharing their nationality, to some extent I also felt an outsider, since the Filipino migrant women I came in contact with most often would know how to speak the local language, such as Italian, Chinese, or Taiwanese, and I did not. Having lived in Italy, Hong Kong, and Taiwan for some years, they have learned to speak the local language, and they tried to teach me some terms that would be helpful for me to get around and take public transportation or show courtesy and politeness.
Being both an insider and outsider, I believe, facilitated my study rather than proved to be a liability. Being an insider allowed me to have an âempathic understandingâ of the structures that engulf their lives (our lives) â in the sense that it was not difficult for me to understand the micro-macro linkages of their (our) experience. I must admit that there were times when I felt a mixture of emotions. I felt angry, sad, and frustrated as I got to know more about their lives and when I got involved in some of their struggles while in the field. To relieve myself, sometimes I cried in silence while in bed, or I revealed my feelings to the NGO workers who helped facilitate my research. They said that they, too, at times felt the same emotions in their work that they sometimes needed to take a break. These emotions gave me a personal taste of what some of the women were undergoing and were coping with: why they cried during personal interviews behind closed doors when they talked about their own children whom they had left behind so that they could care for anothersâ children in order to provide for their own childrenâs needs; why the women who experienced being raped by their employers or their employersâ sons spoke with anger, emotional pain, and feelings of being degraded; why the women who experienced physical abuse often said âI am a human being,â emphasizing that their human dignity was transgressed when treated with disrespect; why the women who were illegally terminated felt exploited; why they resisted and sometimes compromised as they evaluated their possible gains and losses in the middle of the structures of ruling that they were struggling against.
As I grappled with these emotions I became more aware of the personal impact of the structures of neo-liberal globalization that create the pre-conditions for labor export and hence massive economic migration. This triggered in me the insight that the emotions and feelings of the women in this study were also important data to take note of as they revealed the intensity of the personal impact of the structures of power embedded in neo-liberal policies on their lives. Being an insider also sustained me in pursuing this research project: I was and continue to be motivated by the thought that research is also a form of political engagement, as the product of our research enlightens political and social awareness. In fact, movement organizations and non-governmental organizations I came to know in this study see the importance of research in advocacy for change, in organizing, in international networking, and in consciousness-raising and study sessions. I view my research engagement as my personal contribution to the broader movement for national liberation in the Philippines; it is neo-liberal globalization that poses difficulties in the process of decolonization and demilitarization because neo-liberal globalization in the Philippines perpetuates neo-colonial structures (and undermines democratization through militarization) that repress and suppress radical peopleâs movements. Hence, I felt rewarded and felt that this research work had some usefulness when some of the organizations in this study gave me the opportunity to share my findings and analysis in their public forums or study sessions.
As an outsider, my salient role included being aware of my position as a sociologist/researcher trying to understand their experience in order to gain deeper insight into the broader structures of neo-liberal globalization in which labor export is contextualized. I tried to maintain this awareness by writing methodological and theoretical memos while in the field, in addition to writing fieldnotes about what I heard and saw while informally interacting with the domestic workers in different occasions, situations, or activities in which they engaged.
Phasing the Study in the Various Cities
To inquire into the experience of migrant Filipino domestic workers I conducted fieldwork in several sites (usually during the summer when I am freed from teaching): Chicago, Vancouver (in British Columbia, Canada), Taipei, Hong Kong, and Rome. Since this was a long-term study, I divided it in several phases. The first phase: fieldwork in Chicago from 1994â1996 where I interviewed fifty-five Filipino domestic workers using formal and informal interviews, as well as some participant observation in activities of the women. After producing a published article from of this fieldwork in Chicago, I realized that in order to better understand labor export within the context of neo-liberal globalization from the experience of the Filipino migrant domestic workers I should also inquire into their experience in other sites where there are considerable numbers of Filipino migrant domestic workers. Thus, the next phases of this research project came into the plan, turning this into a long-range research project. The second phase: fieldwork in Vancouver in the summer of 1999 where I conducted thirty-five interviews (mostly women and three men who had a nursing degree in the Philippines and came in through Canadaâs Live-in Caregivers Program, a program I touch on later in this book). I also participated in some of the activities of the domestic workers there. Third phase: fieldwork in Hong Kong and Taiwan in the summer of 2000 where I interviewed a total of sixty-four interviews (thirty-four in Hong Kong and thirty in Taiwan, mainly concentrating in Taipei). This fieldwork in Taiwan and Hong Kong was made possible by partial funding from the American Sociological Association/NSF Grant for the Advancement of the Discipline. Fourth phase: fieldwork in Rome in 2001 where I interviewed, formally and informally, thirty Filipino domestic workers (mostly women and four men). I developed my sample through snow-ball sampling since I thought this would be appropriate given the networks the domestic workers have already established, and the case study approach that I was using instead of a survey using questionnaires, an approach that I believed was not as close to the principles of feminist research I had in mind (I discuss this later). My initial contact with domestic workers was facilitated by NGOs who work with migrant domestic workers (which I discuss in the next section).
Other than conducting formal and informal interviews in these sites, I also gathered related literature in universities and other relevant institutions. I used the libraries of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, the library resources of Philippine Womenâs Center in Vancouver, British Columbia, and the library resources at the center of the Mission for Filipino Migrant Workers in Hong Kong, an NGO that organizes and provides support services for Filipino migrants (mostly domestic workers in Hong Kong). In Rome, I visited the Scalabrini International Migration Institute, their Center for Migration Studies, and the library of the University of Rome in Sapienza.
I also made visits to the Philippines in 1996, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2004, and 2007. In 1996, I was able to interview fifteen return migrants, some of whom came home because they could not bear the working conditions they were in, such as non-payment of wages, while others were illegally terminated and filed cases in the Commission on Labor Relations in the Philippines. I also was able to observe the training sessions for departing migrants most of whom were women who were going to work as domestic workers overseas. I attended some of the activities of Migrante International, an international alliance of overseas Filipino workers, such as its 1999 National Congress wherein I got to learn the experiences of the migrant workers through the delegates of the various chapters in different countries, and their international conference on Labor Export and Forced Migration Amidst Globalization, at which I was invited to present some of my findings in this study. I interviewed some of their leaders and members and others who come to their office for help. I also gathered literature and policy documents from research institutes, university libraries, and government offices in the Philippines that I thought had relevance to this study. For example, I went to the Philippine Womenâs Center of the University of the Philippines, Philippine Womenâs Resource Center of GARIELA-Philippines, St. Scholasticâs Womenâs Studies Institute, Third World Studies Center of the University of the Philippines, Scalabrini Center for Migration Studies, the office of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration in Manila, and in Legaspi City, De La Salle University Library in Manila, and IBON Foundation, a progressive think tank and research institute that concentrates on studying Philippine development and political economy from a critical perspective.
Entry into the Field
Often I have been asked how I entered the different fieldwork sites. So, let me say a few words about that. First, what I found helpful was my own political involvement that allowed me the opportunity to establish networks. This network was helpful in establishing initial contacts in the field. For example, it was through my political involvement that I got to know my first contact in conducting fieldwork in Chicago. I met her through my political activities in Chicago with Filipino immigrant activists. Conducting fieldwork requires social skills and networking. As well, my political involvement also allowed me to be aware of the development issues in the Philippines that gave me insights in making decisions as to what relevant research problems to study.
Second, what I also found useful in entering the fieldwork sites was connecting with non-governmental organizations in the field who work directly with Filipino migrant workers, especially domestic workers. This was particularly useful since NGOs already have a network to begin with. My connection with NGOs facilitated my entry into the field not as someone entirely unknown and it contributed in establishing trust with the domestic workers I was meeting for the first time. In Hong Kong my fieldwork was facilitated by the Asia Pacific Mission for Migrants (formerly known as the Asia Pacific Mission for Migrant Filipinos). Later while already in the field, the Mission for Filipino Migrant Workers, also based in Hong Kong, helped facilitate my fieldwork. In Vancouver, the Philippine Womenâs Center was my primary contact and helped facilitate my fieldwork. I used their Kalayaan Center (which they also used as their office), which allowed me to connect with domestic workers. In Taiwan, my initial contact there was facilitated by an organizer of Asia Pacific Mission for Migrants. He gave me a list of contacts of other NGOs there and initial key contact of domestic workers who were organizing there.
Continuing Connections After Leaving the Field
After I returned from the fieldwork sites to organize my fieldwork data and materials and write some articles and papers, I continued, to a limited extent, to keep abreast with the activities of some of the organizations I talk about in this book through their internet-networking, which might include sending out press releases, situationers on particular issues the organizations advocate or lobby for, newsletters, and newsworthy emails. Sometimes I would participate in the letter-writing campaigns that I receive through emails, like that of UNIFIL (United Filipinos) and AMCB in Hong Kong, or the Asia Pacific Mission for Migrants (which I talk about later in this book). I would read and compile these materials â which I continue to do to this day. Sometimes I had the opportunity to attend and speak at the conferences and public forums of these organizations, such as the gatherings of the Philippine Womenâs Center in Vancouver and SIKLAB, the organization of Filipino migrant workers in Canada that includes domestic workers in Toronto in 2005, and the national conference co-sponsored by BAYAN and IBON Foundation on the privatization of water in 2004 at the University of the Philippines. In 2005 I had the opportunity to speak with a Filipina migrant, while I was in Holland, who attended the regional conference of Filipino migrants in Europe. I also had the opportunity in June 2006, to meet with an officer of Migrante International and a staff member of the Mission for Filipino Migrant Workers in Hong Kong who came to Vancouver for a conference and got from them some updated information about their continuing work. In the summer of 2007 I had the opportunity to re-visit Rome and get update information about the work of UMANGAT and the development in their organizational work since the time of my fieldwork.
By continuing connections after leaving the field I was able to some extent gain updated information on recent organizational developments in Vancouver that I was able to incorporate in the text during the final revision of the manuscript.
My continuing connection after leaving the field was also part of my political engagement, part of what I believe âpublic sociologistsâ should also do â to engage as well in changing, contesting, and resisting the conditions of exploitation that they study about.1
The time span between the first phase of this multi-phased research project and the writing and completion of this book allowed me to see which of the organizations I had connections with survived and which did not, and why. This gave me insight into what contributes to sustained resistance in spite of obstacles, difficulties, and sometimes even setbacks.
Feminist Research and Studying Globalization
Studying women/gender, especially women marginalized by the dynamics of globalization, has methodological and epistemological implications. Other scholars, in addition to those I mentioned earlier, also call attention to voice and situated knowledge and to how our approach to studying global processes can shape our conceptualizations about it. For example, Gita Sen and Karen Grown (1987) likewise argue that development analysis must begin from the experience of Third World women since they embody the intersection of gender and class. Chandra Mohanty (2000) and Daiva Stasiulis (1999) also call attention to how feminist theorizing in the North, insensitive to the colonial experience of women in the South, can become another form of imperialism. Esther Nganling Chow (2002, 2003) has also called attention to examining the gendered process of globalization, calling for sensitivity to the different contexts of womenâs lives.
In my own view, feminist research, still largely untapped in mainstream studies on globalization, can offer insights through its response to the methodological iss...
